


Taking the Long Way

by iamtheenemy (Steph)



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 6000 years of repression, Aziraphale Being an Idiot (Good Omens), First Time, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, Pining, Possessive Crowley
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-06-26
Packaged: 2020-05-20 09:07:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19373605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Steph/pseuds/iamtheenemy
Summary: Crawley nodded down at the sweaty humans undulating in a frightfully uncomfortable-looking position below them. “Mating,” he clarified. “One of God’s better ideas, if you ask me. Looks like it could be fun.”“Does it?” Aziraphale asked doubtfully. “It’s all a bit sticky for my tastes. I think She had the right of it with plants. Pollination seems much more sensible.”It takes Aziraphale 6000 years to catch up.





	Taking the Long Way

**Author's Note:**

> While I love the book and the show, this is my first attempt at writing fic in this fandom, so I'm a little nervous.

**3977 B.C.**

 

Aziraphale guarded his post on the wall, watching as the humans went about peopling Earth in the, if you asked him, rather inefficient way that She had engineered for them. He wrinkled his nose and averted his eyes awkwardly as the man emitted an undignified sort of yowl-moan _thing_.

“Interesting, isn’t it?”

Aziraphale started at the voice and turned to see the demon Crawley suddenly standing beside him. It had happened enough since their first introduction following that unfortunate apple business that Aziraphale was no longer surprised to see his serpent-eyed counterpart.

In fact, guarding could be dreadfully dull work, so it was quite nice to have someone to talk to. Not that Aziraphale would admit that, of course. And always keeping in mind that Crawley was an evil creature whose hellish schemes Aziraphale was committed to thwarting. Still, he could spin an entertaining yarn.

“What’s interesting?” Aziraphale asked.

Crawley nodded down at the sweaty humans undulating in a frightfully uncomfortable-looking position below them. “Mating,” he clarified. “One of God’s better ideas, if you ask me. Looks like it could be fun.”

“Does it?” Aziraphale asked doubtfully. “It’s all a bit sticky for my tastes. I think She had the right of it with plants. Pollination seems much more sensible.”

“But the humans wouldn’t _enjoy_ that,” Crawley argued. “And if they didn’t enjoy it, what would be the incentive to _keep_  doing it, especially for the women?”

“The joy of creating life in God’s Divine image?” Aziraphale suggested without much conviction. He’d witnessed childbirth. It was ghastly.

Crawley scoffed. “Please, angel, have you seen the design of the little ones? They’re completely useless for at least the first decade. It’s all crying and eating with them - and talk about _sticky_.”

Aziraphale shifted from one foot to the other, secretly agreeing with him but feeling honourbound to defend the Almighty. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for it. Anyhow, I don’t see why the humans enjoy _that._ ”

“It seems to center around touching and nerve endings,” Crawley said. “Don’t you have the...whole package?” His keen slit-eyed gaze traveled down Aziraphale’s body.

“I’m sure I could,” Aziraphale said, “but why bother? It’s not as if I’m going to pro-create.”

“For pleasure, of course,” Crawley answered. 

“I have all the pleasure I need, thank you very much,” Aziraphale replied.

“Oh?” Crawley responded, sending Aziraphale a dubious look. “From what, exactly?”

“You know,” he answered, “from guarding and thwarting and spreading ethereal good will and what not. I keep quite busy.”

“Mm, you look quite busy,” Crawley replied with a touch of sarcasm that Aziraphale deemed unnecessary.

He sidled closer to Aziraphale in order to peer over the wall. The back of his hand brushed against Aziraphale’s and stayed there as they both watched silently, a small point of contact between them that Aziraphale doubted Crawley even noticed. 

Perhaps, Aziraphale conceded to himself, there was something to be said for physical contact after all. 

Below them, a loud squelching sound emanated from the two squirming bodies. It really was a shame about all the fluids though.

 

* * *

 

Crawley, excuse him, _Crowley_ was proven right in the following centuries as the population multiplied quickly. The humans seemed to derive plenty of pleasure from the act of intercourse, if their constant desperation for it was anything to go by. It wasn’t too long before they were doing it even without the hope of bearing children. Women with other women, men with other men. Using their mouths and hands and bums and _feet_. Aziraphale had to applaud their ingenuity, at the very least.

But his first impressions of the whole business had been correct as well: intercourse was messy and squishy and loud and rank and, on some occasions, painful. Women seemed to have the worst end of things - same as it ever was - though that lessened somewhat after they thought up lubricant, thanks to a tiny nudge in the right direction from Aziraphale.

Intercourse also incited humans to do the very worst things to one another. It could, just like everything else that they got around to discovering or inventing, become a weapon to the wrong people. At least three of the seven deadly sins came about because of it.

But Aziraphale had also seen it used as an expression of love and joy and intimacy between two - or occasionally more - people. It wasn’t all bad.

 

* * *

 

He finally gave himself the _whole package_ around 200 B.C. 

When in Rome and what not. He couldn’t show up under dressed, so to speak, to a Bacchanalia while doing a bit of thwarting. That would have definitely turned heads.

 

* * *

 

Aziraphale loved the finer things. He enjoyed strong wine and crusty breads and hard cheeses. He wore well-made clothing and the most comfortable shoes. And he positively reveled in a good book. 

It should come as no surprise, then, that if there was a way to make his body feel pleasure, he would eventually try it out.

But not with humans. That was strictly out of the question. Aziraphale loved them all, of course, but in the general, vaguely paternal way that a teacher might love his students. 

Having come to that conclusion, it meant that there were no other options left for him. None at all. Aziraphale could absolutely, unequivocally think of no one else who fit the bill. So he was left to his own devices.

The genitals themselves were a bit lumpy and soft and not at all pleasing to look at, but maybe humans liked that sort of thing?

Tentatively, he ran the palm of his hand over the pale skin down there and flinched at the unfamiliar sensation. He miracled up a small bowl of warm oil on the table beside him. Coating a few fingers with the slippery liquid, he wrapped his hand around his penis and sighed. 

“Oh, that’s quite nice,” he said out loud, eyebrows climbing in surprise, and slowly began to move his hand up and down the length of it. It wasn’t long before it started to stiffen and grow, curving up towards his belly and just slightly to the right. This was an erection, he realized with fascination, watching the skin darken to a dull red. How lovely!

He quickened the pace of the hand around his penis, and then it occurred to him that he had a whole other hand that he could use. Curiously, he brought that one down to the testicles below. Aziraphale knew he’d done something right when they immediately tightened and something deep in his belly seemed to seize up as well, and then…

Ah. There was the fluid.

Aziraphale smeared his hand through the mess on his stomach curiously, giving it a sniff and a bit of a taste. He grimaced and then miracled it away. 

The experience was pleasant, if a bit anticlimactic, all told. At least now he knew what the humans were always on about.

 

* * *

 

**1603**

 

No one could ever accuse Crowley of not living up to his end of a bargain. Or at least Aziraphale couldn’t, as he very much doubted Crowley was in the habit of making bargains with anyone else. 

Hamlet didn’t just become a hit. It was an absolute sensation. Aziraphale even heard talk about it all the way up in Edinburgh. 

When he mentioned it the next time he had reason to see Crowley again, the demon turned a peculiar shade of puce and claimed it was because his miracling was rusty from disuse. Heaven forbid he admit to any act of kindness.

Still, admitted to or not, Aziraphale believed in rewarding good deeds, and so he offered to buy Crowley a drink. The fact that Aziraphale would get to spend a bit of extra time with him was utterly circumstantial. 

Several hours into their cups, Crowley asked, “Have you ever thought about changing your body?”

Aziraphale looked down at his lap and back up to Crowley. “That? My dear, I did that thousands of years back.”

Crowley’s hand slipped and sent mead sloshing over the rim of his cup. “No. What? No. I meant...what, _really_?” 

Aziraphale bristled at his shock. “Yes, really. I’ve had to blend in with the locals over the years.”

“But have you, you know,” Crowley said, “used it?”

“I don’t see how that’s any of your business,” Aziraphale answered, embarrassed by Crowley’s slackjawed amazement.

Crowley straightened and looked much less drunk than he had a moment before. “You have. You’ve used it.”

Aziraphale looked around at who might be listening before leaning in and saying, “Only on my own. Now can we please change the subject?” 

After his first attempt, he’d experimented with all the various parts of his human body that others seemed to enjoy. But given the choice, he much preferred to spend his time with a good book and a cup of tea.

Crowley stared at him a moment longer in silence. Then shook himself out of his thoughts, and said, “That’s not...that’s not what I was asking about anyway. I meant have you ever changed your body…” He waved a hand in front of his face, “...cosmetically?”

“Oh, I see,” Aziraphale answered. “No, I haven’t. It took me long enough to get used to this one. Why?”

Crowley shrugged. “I’ve been thinking about making a change lately. I’m getting a bit bored. Thought maybe a new body might --”

“Don’t,” slipped out of Aziraphale’s mouth before he even knew he was going to say it.

Crowley froze. “I’m sorry?”

“That is,” Aziraphale backtracked hastily, “I’d never dream of telling you what to do with your own human body. It’s just that over the years, I’ve grown…” _fond_   “accustomed to your current form, that’s all. And obviously if I’m to thwart your wiles, it would be easier for me to do it if I could more quickly spot you. In a crowd.”

Crowley watched him with a queer half-smile that made something inside of Aziraphale’s belly shift uncomfortably. Then he took a sip from his cup and answered, “If it’s to help the Arrangement, then I suppose I can stay the way that I am.”

Aziraphale let out a heavy breath and said, “Whatever you think is best.”

 

* * *

 

**1793**

 

The crepes really were divine. And considering Aziraphale came all this way and avoided an inconvenient discorporation to get them, he deserved a little decadence.

The fresh cream that came with them was deliciously sweet and just the right consistency, while the ripened berries burst with flavour in his mouth. Glorious. 

Crowley, as was his wont, allowed Aziraphale to order for him and then ate a few bites before pushing his plate across the table. Aziraphale obliged him by polishing off the rest while Crowley moved onto his third glass of wine.

“Well?” Crowley asked, his chin resting atop one fist. “Was it good enough to lose your head over?”

Aziraphale allowed himself a self-deprecating smile. “It’s lovely, but not quite worth the paperwork.” He thought about it. “Perhaps the cream.”

“Hm.” Crowley reached out and dipped one long finger into the bowl, before popping it into his mouth. 

Aziraphale felt a spark of warmth run down his spine as his eyes were drawn to the movement. He rarely lost control of his own body’s reactions. But it seemed - and he was doing his very best not to analyze this in any way - that the only time he did was around Crowley. Probably a fluke. A two thousand year fluke. 

“It’s all right,” Crowley declared of the cream once he’d swallowed it. 

Aziraphale cleared his throat and pushed those traitorous thoughts out of his mind. “All the same, I’m still grateful for your timely rescue.”

Crowley glared at him. “What did I tell you about saying thank you?”

“Fine, then I will _not_ say thank you, dear boy, for the intervention,” Aziraphale said.

Crowley raised his glass. “And I won’t say you’re welcome,” he replied.

 

* * *

 

**1862**

 

That blasted, infernal, _impossible_ demon! If he thought that Aziraphale would ignore the rules and acquiesce to his ridiculous demand for holy water, of all things, then he was going to be disappointed. 

Absolutely not. There were strict guidelines and paperwork required and...and…

He couldn’t do it. Not to Crowley. He wouldn't allow anything bad to happen to him. It was simply...unacceptable. For...for a whole host of reasons.

The Arrangement, for one. The balance of good and evil forces on Earth, for another. Can’t just go around messing that up. 

And long conversations in long gone taverns. Last minute rescues from the Bastille. Six thousand years of…

Well, he wouldn’t do it. And that was that.

 

* * *

 

**1888**

 

For several months in 1887, Sir Edwin Pendleton had visited Aziraphale’s bookshop two or three times a week, every week. At first it had bothered Aziraphale, who harboured a deep aversion to customers touching his books. Over time, however, it became clear that Edwin, as he insisted on being called, had no real interest in the books at all, but was instead there for Aziraphale’s company.

The poor chap must have been terribly lonely. And being that providing happiness was part of the angelic job description, so to speak, Aziraphale humoured the man.

Plus, though he’d once told Crowley that he had plenty of people to fraternize with, the truth was that when the demon wasn’t around, he hadn’t much in the way of companionship.

So when Edwin presented to him with an invitation to join the Hardwell Society, a discreet and selective gentlemen’s club in the heart of London, Aziraphale could think of no reason to refuse him.

The dozen or so men who made up the usual group were all thoroughly friendly and welcoming to Aziraphale. He’d been attending weekly with Edwin for going on three months when one day they arrived at their usual time, only to find Crowley there waiting, arms crossed and leaning against the doorway. 

“Crowley!” he cried, doing his best to tamp down on his happiness at seeing the demon. It had been several decades since their last encounter, and their disagreement had lingered in Aziraphale's mind ever since.

“Aziraphale, we have to talk,” Crowley said.

“Of course,” Aziraphale answered, before turning to Edwin. “I’ll join you momentarily.”

He gestured for Crowley to take the lead, and the two of them walked around to the side of the building. 

“Tell me this isn’t about holy water again,” Aziraphale begged when they were alone. He had no desire to have that fight for a second time.

“No, it’s...angel...” Crowley said. He sounded uncharacteristically unsure of himself, and Aziraphale began to get nervous.

“Has something gone wrong? It’s not, you know…” He attempted to make a hand motion that encompassed a world ending apocalypse that culminated in the Great War between heaven and hell. It came out as just sort of an emphatic circle, but Crowley took his meaning nonetheless.

“Nothing like that. Nothing’s wrong. I just...I heard you were coming here…” Crowley trailed off, but his eyebrows continued the conversation for him, wiggling significantly above his sunglasses.

“Yes?” Aziraphale asked.

“ _Here_ ,” Crowley repeated. When Aziraphale stared at him in confusion, he asked, “Do you _do anything_ here?”

Aziraphale frowned. “Well, we don’t sit around in silence, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“What do you do, exactly?” he asked.

Aziraphale peeked his head around the corner and saw Edwin still waiting at the entrance, far enough away to be out of earshot. He turned back to Crowley.

“This place is meant to be discreet. I don’t think they’d want me to tell you,” he admitted.

Crowley took a step closer, and Aziraphale took a corresponding one back, feeling himself bump up against the building.

“You can trust me, angel,” he said.

“But I don’t see why you need to know,” Aziraphale countered. 

“Because we have an Arrangement,” Crowley said, “and it doesn’t work if one of us is sneaking around keeping secrets from the other.”

“I hardly think that _dancing_ constitutes a secret big enough to endanger the Arrangement,” Aziraphale said.

Crowley froze and then took a step back. “Dancing?” he repeated.

“Yes, if you must know, these gentlemen have been teaching me a fantastic little number called the gavotte, which is -- “

“I know what the gavotte is,” Crowley said, cutting him off. “ _That’s_ what you do here every week? _Dance_?”

“Among other things,” Aziraphale said defensively. He ran his hands down the lapels of his coat and straightened his bow tie. “We also talk about books and politics and drink brandy. Some of the men smoke pipes, but I don’t partake.”  

Crowley’s face was doing something strange that Aziraphale couldn’t read, and it took several moments to smooth itself out again. It looked a bit like he’d swallowed his tongue, which, if one took into account its considerable length, would have been quite the predicament.

“Why? What did you think we got up to?” Aziraphale asked, sure down to his bones that he was missing something important.

Crowley’s mouth hung open for a second too long before he answered, “I took you for more of a polka sort.”

“Good heavens!” Aziraphale exclaimed.

Crowley took another step back and motioned towards the door. “In you go then. Dance lessons wait for no man, ethereal or otherwise.”

“Just so,” Aziraphale agreed and they both rounded the corner.

“Who’s that?” Crowley asked, nodding to Edwin, who was still waiting at the door, the polite fellow.

“Sir Edwin Pendleton. He’s the one who first extended the invitation for me to come here.”

“ _Sir Edwin Pendleton_ ,” Crowley repeated in a tone very unlike the one Aziraphale had used. He sniffed. “I don’t like him.”

“Wh…” Aziraphale began, but then arrived back in earshot of the man in question, so he snapped his mouth shut. 

“This is where I leave you,” Crowley said, his formality clearly for Edwin’s benefit. He tipped his hat. “Good day, Aziraphale.” 

“Crowley!” Aziraphale said to his retreating back. The demon turned around and stared at him expectantly. “Next time…” _stay a little longer. We’ll grab lunch. Or dinner. Wherever you’d like. And don’t ask me to help you hurt yourself. Please, not ever again._ “...stay out of trouble.”

He gave Aziraphale a devilish smirk. “Now that doesn’t sound like me.”

“Who was he?” Edwin asked once Crowley had gone.

Aziraphale rolled the question over in his head a moment before answering, “An old friend.”

Edwin winked and tapped a finger on the side of his nose conspiratorially. “I have a few of those myself.”

“Ahh,” Aziraphale answered awkwardly, “quite.”

Then Edwin took a step towards the door and promptly tripped over nothing at all, landing in the bushes in a heap.

 

* * *

 

**1941**

 

Aziraphale had gone without seeing Crowley for more than fifty years, not that he’d been counting, only to have him pop up at exactly the right moment. Crowley saving his life and then being exceedingly grumpy about it afterwards was becoming a bit of a habit for them. 

This time, though, it wasn’t just Aziraphale’s human body he’d saved. He’d had the presence of mind to save his books, when even Aziraphale have forgotten them in all the excitement. Now he sat beside Crowley in his sleek, black automobile, leather case hugged firmly in his lap.

If he were the sort who cared about such things, he would have made note that Crowley looked quite dapper in his stylish black suit and matching fedora. But, of course, Aziraphale had no interest in such matters, and so it remained firmly unnoted.

The automobile raced down the empty London streets - fine time for a drive, during an air raid - while Aziraphale focused on not noting things and also trying to calm his useless, fluttering heart. Oh, human bodies could be so inconveniently finicky!

“It’s been a while since we’ve seen each other. What demonic pursuits have you gotten yourself up to?” he asked to distract himself.

Crowley swerved around a corner with such veracity that it plastered Aziraphale’s back into the leather seat. He clung to the door handle for dear life.

“Slept a few decades,” Crowley answered with a shrug. “Woke up to find out I’d missed one war completely and that the world was on the brink of another. Sent a memo Downstairs: _'talked to Adolf, it’s all going to plan’_ yada yada.”

“So you took credit for it,” Aziraphale surmised.

“I had to!” Crowley said. “I’d be made redundant otherwise. Hell wouldn’t need me if they knew that the humans were coming up with these ideas themselves!” 

Aziraphale, who had not slept through the Great War, nor any of the wars proceeding it, nodded. “They really can be astonishingly evil. Sometimes I wonder if free will is all it’s cracked up to be.”

“Make me look like an amateur,” Crowley agreed. “What have you been doing, besides getting duped by incompetent Nazis? Still _gavotting_ around?”

Aziraphale sighed. “No, the gavotte has fallen out of fashion, I’m afraid. More’s the pity. I’d gotten quite good at it.”

Crowley slanted him a look. “Had you, now?” 

Aziraphale straightened in his seat, equal parts offended by Crowley’s insinuation about his dancing skills and terrified of his driving. “Eyes on the road, Crowley! And yes, in fact.”

Crowley turned back with an expression that said he was only bothering for Aziraphale’s sake. They sped along the darkened roads toward the bookshop in silence a while, before Crowley spoke again.

“It really is a nasty business, what’s going on now,” he admitted.

“Dreadful,” Aziraphale said with feeling.

“Doesn’t look good for the allies either,” he continued.

“Not at the moment, no,” Aziraphale agreed. He took a deep breath. “But in the end, good always triumphs over evil, so this too shall pass.” He knew he was trying to convince himself as much as Crowley. Outside, another bomb fell in the distance.

“Yeahhh,” Crowley said, “but maybe it would pass a little quicker if you and I worked together to...help it along a bit? Under the radar.”

Aziraphale turned to him. A demon, yes, but his oldest and dearest friend, going against everything he’s meant to stand for by suggesting that they thwart the forces of Hell together.

Crowley must have noticed the look on his face, because he added hastily, “The faster it’s all over, the faster we can get back to our normal lives. I’m sure your favourite restaurants have been decimated by the rationing, if not the actual, you know, bombs dropping.” 

Aziraphale remained quiet as something strange and new opened up in his chest.

Crowley shifted under his gaze. “I’m only suggesting we help ourselves. Stop staring at me like that.”

Adoration, that’s what the feeling inside him was. Aziraphale adored Crowley, from his silly red hair down to his snakeskin shoes. How had he failed to see it before?

“Well?” Crowley asked.

And Aziraphale almost said it aloud, right then, for the whole blasted world to hear. His mouth was open, the words bubbling up, like drinking a good champagne, but in reverse, when a little voice in the back of his mind asked, _and just how would that go down with Management, I wonder?_

Like a lead balloon.

“Angel, are you all right?” Crowley asked.

“Yeah, yes, quite,” Aziraphale stuttered, forcing the words back down his throat and into his heart, secreted away. “I think that’s a good idea. Let’s discuss it over drinks at mine.” 

 

* * *

 

**45 Minutes After Armageddon**

 

They’d averted the end of the world, at least for a bit, but they still had Home Office to contend with. Aziraphale sat on the bus beside Crowley and smoothed out the paper in his hand, the last of Agnes Nutter’s prophecies.

A plan was starting to form in his mind, but he couldn’t stop thinking about the way Crowley looked at him at the bus stop. ‘ _Our side,’_ he’d said, and the desperate tone of his voice, begging him to finally listen, tugged at Aziraphale.

He thought back earlier, at the airbase, to how Crowley had stood shoulder to shoulder with him all the way to the end of the world. 

Alpha Centauri. He’d go there in a second now. 

Further back still, decades back, the look on Crowley’s face when Aziraphale scurried away that night with the holy water. ‘ _You go too fast for me.’_

What a fool he’d been. What a coward.   

 

* * *

 

**Sunday**

 

It was done. They’d either flouted prophesy or played right into it, depending on who you asked. The whole thing was very confusing, and Aziraphale, who was used to living a much slower lifestyle, had had quite the week.

He’d been to Hell and back, literally, and now he was ready for his reward.

He savoured his last sip of champagne before turning to Crowley and asking, “What will you do after this?”

Crowley shrugged, the forced nonchalance in his expression obvious to anyone who knew him, and Aziraphale knew him better than anyone.

“Don’t know,” he said. “Go to Paris, perhaps? Or Tokyo? I could try one of those little Caribbean islands, haven’t been to them in centuries. What about you?”

There was a lightness that came along with the certainty that one was about to make exactly the right choice. You would think that, as an angel, Aziraphale was used to the feeling. In fact, in his whole life, since the very dawn of creation, he’d only experienced it one other time: when he’d refused to fight for Heaven’s army and went back to Earth instead. He felt it again now, suffusing him with a bright weightlessness that might have taken him floating to the ceiling if he wasn’t careful.

He still hadn’t answered.

Crowley continued, unaware of the Moment Aziraphale was having beside him. “You’ll stay around here, I suppose. Putter around that old bookshop of yours.”

“Actually,” Aziraphale said, “it appears I’ll be travelling.”

“Oh?” Crowley asked.

“Yes. To Paris or Tokyo or, where was it? Ah yes, the Caribbean.” He folded his hands together in front of him and watched Crowley’s expression.

Crowley shook his head with a frown. “What?” 

“You see, the only thing I have planned for the rest of eternity is loving you,” Aziraphale admitted, smiling as Crowley gaped beside him. “And those plans are written in stone, so you’re stuck with me, I’m afraid.”

“Why - ”

“Because I love you.”

Crowley sputtered once, twice, before gathering himself and saying gruffly, “Don’t go soft on me, angel.”

“I’ve been reliably informed that I _am_ soft. And I do love you, so very much.” He reached out and placed his hand over Crowley’s. The long fingers tightened in his and there was a fine tremor running through them. 

“Of course you do,” Crowley answered, staring at their entwined hands. “You’re an angel, you’re made out of love. You love everything, that’s the whole point of you.”

Aziraphale nodded, though Crowley couldn’t see it, still focused, as he was, on their hands touching. It brought up in Aziraphale a distant memory from long ago of two lonely figures atop a wall, the backs of their hands brushing. 

“It is. I love all of God’s creatures. I also love a good vintage and a second helping of dessert,” he admitted. “But not the way that I love you. Not even close. I suppose that must make me a bad angel. But then, we already knew that.”

“And what about your musty, old books?” Crowley asked with forced levity.

“I would burn every single one of them again myself if they dared keep me from you,” Aziraphale said, and that got Crowley’s head jerking up to meet his eyes.

He looked entirely lost, but that was fine. He’d already spent so long guiding the two of them in the right direction that it was high time for Aziraphale to take a turn at the wheel.

“Dear boy, you’ve been trying to tell me, haven’t you? And I refused to listen. Well, I’m listening now. Heaven and Hell don’t matter. It’s only our side, isn’t that right? Only us, together. I’m sorry it took me so long to understand.”

Aziraphale lifted Crowley’s hand to his lips and kissed it. 

A kiss, Aziraphale knew, despite what the songs and poems would lead you to believe, wasn’t always an act of love. Often it was done out of lust or condolence or pity or joy, or for any number of other reasons. Aziraphale couldn’t claim much experience with the act itself, but now he did his very best to put all the love he felt for this wonderful, irascible demon into it.

It was hard to transmit over six thousand years of repressed longing into a simple press of his lips to the back of a hand, but he did his best. 

Something must have gotten through, thankfully, because, after a moment of stillness, Crowley came to life. He ripped his hand out of Aziraphale’s grasp and pushed him back in his chair. 

Aziraphale slammed against the plush cushion and had a moment to catch a breath he didn’t need before Crowley had surged up and over him and caught his mouth in a desperate kiss. 

Usually, no matter the external temperature, Aziraphale was always comfortably warm. Cozy, one might call it. This was decidedly not cozy. This was pleasure and friction so hot, Aziraphale could hardly stand it and never wanted it to stop all at once.

Crowley’s hands gripped either side of his face possessively, holding Aziraphale still under the onslaught — as though Aziraphale was going anywhere. If he had his way, he’d never do anything else again. Just this for the rest of eternity. 

He had the dim thought, from the very tiny part of his mind that was still somehow capable of such things, that he now understood why so many atrocities were committed in want of this. Aziraphale would wage war against anyone who tried to make him stop. He would raze cities to the ground. He would…

A delicate cough interrupted his thoughts. With a slick parting of lips and limbs, Crowley pulled away from Aziraphale and thunked back into his own chair. 

Their waiter stood awkwardly beside them, and Aziraphale remembered with a start that they weren’t alone in the world. They were still sitting at their table at the Ritz, now surrounded by a very avid audience of gawking onlookers.

“Sirs, I’m going to have to ask you to…”

Crowley gave a careless wave with one hand, while the other fixed his glasses. Aziraphale straightened his bow tie. Immediately, the patrons turned back to their own conversations, prurient interest forgotten. The waiter’s expression cleared. 

“Would you like another glass of champagne?” he asked.

Crowley waved again. “No, we’re done here,” he said, and Aziraphale knew he had taken care of the bill. “Are you ready to go, angel?”

“Quite,” Aziraphale agreed. 

 

* * *

 

They made their way to the Bentley and slammed the doors shut. Crowley started the engine before turning to look at Aziraphale.

“Back to yours?” he asked.

“Whatever you’d like,” Aziraphale responded.

Crowley nodded. “Back to yours,” he repeated. “And angel, you’ll tell me if I go too fast, won’t you?”

With a flick of the wrist, Aziraphale gunned the engine and slammed down on the accelerator, setting the car speeding off down the street, Crowley’s joyful laughter ringing in his ears.

 

* * *

 

By the time they made it back to Aziraphale’s bookshop, there was a convenient bedroom in the back where there hadn’t been one before, as Aziraphale never had need of one.

There was a chance, however, that he’d gone a bit overboard in his enthusiasm. 

They both stopped to take in the newly furnished room, complete with a giant, fluffy-looking four-poster bed, covered in a gauzy canopy and surrounded by dozens of merrily twinkling candles that wouldn’t have been out of place in the most heavy-handed of Harlequin romances.

“Er…” Aziraphale said, feeling embarrassed at this glimpse into his subconscious. He raised a hand to make it all a little less showy. “I’ll just --”

Crowley touched his arm, gently pushing it down. “Don’t,” he said. “It’s perfect.”

“Oh,” Aziraphale answered, fiddling with his coat and trying not to show how pleased that made him. “If you think so.”

“I do,” Crowley said. “I really do.” Then he used one hand to slide open the canopy and pushed Aziraphale onto the bed with the other. 

Aziraphale landed with a pleasant thump on a velvety soft duvet and pushed himself up on his elbows as Crowley loomed over him, a most beloved predator ready to strike.

“Now might be a good time to remind you that I don’t have experience in this arena,” Aziraphale said even as his clumsy fingers began undoing the buttons of his shirt.

Crowley stopped, his jacket off and his grey shirt nearly over his head and stared at him. “You told me you’d used it,” he recalled.

“But only by myself, I said,” Aziraphale countered.

“That was 400 years ago!” Crowley said.

“Well, it’s not as if anything’s changed since then,” Aziraphale said.

Crowley finished taking off his shirt and tossed it aside. He crawled onto the bed and straddled Aziraphale’s hips.

“Oh my,” Aziraphale breathed, feeling his penis begin to fill faster than it ever had before.

“So you’re telling me that no one else has ever touched you like this?” The look in Crowley’s eyes was positively devilish, and Aziraphale shifted beneath him in response.

“That’s what I’m telling you,” he said.

“Not even _Sir Edwin Pendleton_?” Crowley asked.

Aziraphale stared up at him, mind a complete blank. “Who?” he asked, and that only made Crowley grin wider.

“Your gavotte partner. Sir Edwin bloody Pendleton,” Crowley repeated, and Aziraphale’s sluggish brain caught up to Crowley.

“Edwin?” he said, astonished. “Of course not. What makes you think that?”

“He invited you to a discreet gentlemen’s club in Victorian London,” Crowley pointed out. “He wanted in your angelic pants, Aziraphale, believe me.”

He opened his mouth to disagree, but then a flood of memories came back to him in a new context. “Huh,” he said instead.

“What’s that?” Crowley asked.

“It does explain why he got a bit handsy with the dance instruction,” Aziraphale admitted.

Crowley growled and between one breath and the next, all of their clothes were gone. “He must have some descendants still alive,” he said darkly.

“Crowley, don’t you dare,” Aziraphale said, entirely too delighted.

“Hmm,” Crowley said. “I suppose little Eddy Pendleton the fifth can keep breathing for now. If it makes you happy.”

“Since you’re taking note of things that make me happy, I very much enjoyed the kissing earlier,” Aziraphale said hopefully.

“Oh yes?” Crowley’s tone was teasing, but the way his face softened betrayed him. Aziraphale ached at the vulnerability he could see in him, clear as day. His dear, dear Crowley.

“Shall we try it again?” Aziraphale asked.

Crowley needed no further urging, bending down and kissing him eagerly. The desperation from earlier was gone, but none of the passion had waned. It flared something bone deep and carnal inside of Aziraphale that he’d never felt before. 

He wrapped his arms around Crowley’s back, which had the added benefit of bringing their bodies even closer together. Closer, Aziraphale was learning quickly, was better. It was so much better. 

Crowley’s hands were running down the sides of his body, a deliberate touch that was somehow both soothing and maddening in equal measures, a bit like the man himself.  

He pulled away from Aziraphale with one last, lingering kiss, and said, “You can’t do _this_ on your own.” 

Then he proceeded to kiss down Aziraphale’s body, stopping behind his ear and at the point where his neck met his shoulder. No one had told Aziraphale about that part. The shivering began somewhere around his collarbone, and by the time Crowley reached his nipples, which Aziraphale had written off as wholly superfluous for men ages ago, he was already nearly undone.

“How…?” he gasped.

“You’d forgotten what I told you back then,” Crowley admonished. “Sex is about touch. Your own touch is all right, but someone else’s is always better. Sparks the nerve endings. See?” With a long clever tongue, he sucked on one of Aziraphale’s peaked nipples, while his fingers plucked the other.

“Ah,” Aziraphale sighed, his body responding deliciously to the new sensation. His penis was so full that it had started to throb in time to every roll of Crowley’s tongue. “And what about with someone you love?”

Crowley lifted his head, but his fingers still continued strumming Aziraphale along. “I wouldn’t know. Until now.”

Aziraphale felt a soft smile stretch across his face. “My dear,” he answered.

“Oh, shut up,” Crowley replied and got back to work.

The path down his body was torturously slow enough to assure Aziraphale that, yes, Crowley was, indeed, a demon after all. He finally reached Aziraphale’s cock, but not before Aziraphale discovered that light nails scratching over his thighs felt heavenly, but the same touch on his knees tickled like mad.  

The first touch of Crowley’s hand around his length sent his hips skyrocketing and his eyes nearly rolling back in his head. 

Crowley chuckled, a dark, tempting sound that sent the hairs on the back of Aziraphale’s neck rising. “Angel, if that’s all it takes…”

Aziraphale couldn’t come up with a witty reply. All he could do was claw at the duvet and then at Crowley’s shoulders, holding on for dear life. Crowley's hand stopped after a few tight pumps, and he moved away, despite Aziraphale’s very emphatic disgruntlement.

“I’m not done with you yet, Aziraphale,” Crowley answered. It should have been ominous, but instead it sparked a sharp sting of anticipatory heat zipping through Aziraphale’s body.

Crowley rubbed the fingers of one hand together until they glistened with miracled lubricant. Then he sat up on his knees and brought the hand behind himself. Aziraphale may have been new to this, but he understood what was happening, and at least one part of him was very much on board.

“Oh my,” he whispered wonderingly. “What a picture you make.”

“View’s not so bad from up here either,” Crowley hissed. He finished preparing himself, and then in one smooth movement, took Aziraphale in his hand and guided his cock inside himself.

When he sunk down as far as he could go, they both froze, overcome. 

He gazed at Crowley above him, at his face contorted in an expression of such fierce pleasure and blazing, incandescent love, and Aziraphale marveled at the gift he’d been given. It was one he certainly didn’t deserve, but he’d never take it for granted again.

“You’re so lovely,” he said and didn’t give Crowley space to deny it. Instead, he put a hand around the back of Crowley’s neck and pulled him down for another deep kiss, Crowley’s arms bracketing each side of his head.

It was perfect. And then Crowley began to move, rocking his hips in a slow, hot, wet slide, and the very definition of perfection was torn up and remade for Aziraphale for the rest of eternity, because surely nothing could more accurately describe it than this.

“How do I…?” he broke off, gasping, as Crowley tightened around him. “What should I do to help you?” he asked, wanting to make Crowley feel the same exquisite rightness that he did.

Crowley groaned and scrambled to take Aziraphale’s hand, bringing it down to wrap around Crowley’s straining erection.

“Stroke it,” he ordered.

 _Stroke_ had never been a particularly racy word to Aziraphale, but spoken in Crowley’s low, seductive hiss, it came out positively pornographic.

Aziraphale did as he was told, trying to keep pace with the rhythm that Crowley was setting above him, hoping he was doing it right, but knowing he couldn’t hope to bring the same pleasure with his inexpert hand that Crowley was giving to him.

Either by luck or demonic intervention, just as Aziraphale’s whole body seized up in ecstatic relief, Crowley came as well, wetness coating Aziraphale’s chest and stomach. Crowley slumped forward into Aziraphale’s waiting arms and gasped into the side of his neck before gently sliding free and heaving himself up and over to lie beside him.

Aziraphale wasn’t ready for the loss of contact, and he reached out, taking Crowley’s hand in his own. 

“So, what did you think?” Crowley asked. “Sticky?”

Aziraphale rubbed at the mess on his belly. “Very. But I find I’m not as averse to it as I once thought.”

“Glad I could help change your mind,” Crowley said. 

“We should stay in this bed for a hundred years,” Aziraphale decided.

“You’ll get no complaints from me,” Crowley said.

A stray thought suddenly went through Aziraphale’s mind, chilling him to the bone. “Imagine if you hadn’t spoken to me that day in Eden,” he said. “Imagine if we had to live these last six thousand years without each other.”

“Worse than Falling,” Crowley said, and the look in his eyes told Aziraphale he meant it.

Aziraphale blinked and cleared his throat. “Well, all part of the ineffable plan, I suppose.”

“You and that word again,” Crowley grumbled, untangling their hands so that he could wrap his arm around Aziraphale’s middle, cleaning up the mess as he went. “Aziraphale, would you really burn all of your books for me?”

“Yes,” Aziraphale assured him, and then, after a beat, added sheepishly, “But only as a last resort.”

“There you are.”

**Author's Note:**

> Consider this blanket permission to use this story for any remix, podfic, translation, fanart or other transformative work you'd like, but please inform me, credit me and provide me any links so that I can include it in the notes. 
> 
> Join me on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/theres-a-goldensky)!


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